India’s ‘first solar-powered train’: All you want to know about Indian Railways’ green initiative

With Indian Railways aggressively focusing on renewable energy, India’s first solar panel-fitted train is all set to commence trial runs shortly.

What makes this trial run special is that all coaches of the train would be lit from power generated by the rooftop solar panels.

Last year, Northern Railways had fitted one coach of the Rewari-Sitapur broad gauge passenger train with solar panels. However, this would be the first DEMU (Diesel Electric Multiple Unit) broad gauge train, in which all coaches have solar panels, says Railways.

The solar-panel powered train will be tested on the Jodhpur division of the North Western Railways. The DEMU train which is being used for the trial run has eight coaches, with each coach fitted with twelve solar panels. More info